


Blank Slate

by MissBegottenLit (SoulTinkerer)



Series: Things Left Unsaid [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Allusions to sexual assault if you look really hard, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-21
Updated: 2016-04-21
Packaged: 2018-06-03 13:38:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6612685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoulTinkerer/pseuds/MissBegottenLit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five things Bucky learned from the Smithsonian, and the one thing he still doesn’t understand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blank Slate

**1\. His best friend is Steve Rogers.**

That’s what the exhibit said-- _best friends since childhood_. Because apparently there was a time before he was so confused, before he was the Winter Soldier, before he was a Howling Commando or a sergeant… There was a time when he was just Bucky, and Steve was just Steve, a skinny, sniffling kid with a chip on his shoulder and the bronze balls of a brontosaurus.

Those memories are the clearest, he realizes. The earliest ones were difficult to dig out of his burnt and dusty brain, but once he found them they were sharp, untainted, unsinged. Little Steve was clearer in his mind than the juggernaut he'd fought on the helicarrier and pulled from the river.

*

The day is hot and sticky, but Bucky had won 35 cents playing poker behind the school, and he wants to ride the Cyclone. He drags Steve along, and he follows dutifully, stumbling a bit in the too-big shoes he had on his feet. Bucky never said a word about Steve's clothes. Everyone was worn and patched up like rag-dolls, Steve more than anyone, but that didn't mean he didn't try. His mom washed his clothes, and he tucked in his shirt and combed his hair, and as far as Bucky is concerned, a rag-doll who tried was better than a sloppy snob in a suit.

They pay their money, and when they have to stand by the painted board to measure their height, Steve puffs out his scrawny chest and stands as tall as he can. Bucky doesn’t think Steve quite reaches the line, but the woman gives him a conspiratorial smile and lets him through anyway.

It’s not until after the swirly, rickety ride, after the air and adrenaline and laughter and the gut churning ups and downs, that Bucky thinks this whole adventure might have been a bad idea. Steve doesn’t make it off the ride before he vomits on his too-big shoes. Bucky helps him down, careful not to step in the sick that managed to find its way to the ground, and grabs a handful of napkins from a hotdog stand on their way by.

"Ah, Steve, I'm sorry," he says as he helps his friend over to a bench and sits him down.

"'M all right," Steve lies. His face is green, his carefully combed hair is a mess, and there is the tiniest tremble in his voice and hands.

Bucky holds out the wad of rough paper napkins, and Steve takes them. "You should've said you didn't want to go on the ride."

"I did want to go," Steve says and begins wiping the vomit off his shoes. "But it's not like you woulda listened, anyway."

Unable to argue with that, Bucky can only sit back and commiserate while Steve cleans himself up. At one point he takes his shoes off and pulls out the wads of newspaper he'd stuffed in to make himself tall enough to ride. It’s not until long after he’s done, after he's pulled himself back together and stopped shaking, after they've sat in silence together watching people walk by and felt the hot afternoon sink down into evening, that he speaks.

"Bucky?"

"Yeah?"

"These were my dad's shoes.”

 

**2\. He only kills people who deserve to be killed.**

There were people everywhere, packed into the Smithsonian exhibit like ants in an anthill. Captain America had just defeated HYDRA and saved millions of lives, after all, and it seemed like visiting a museum was the best way these people knew to celebrate. No one here seemed all that preoccupied with the fact that their hero had been found broken, bleeding, and half-drowned on the banks of the Potomac. Captain America was alive and so were they--what did the details matter?

The crowd gave him all the cover he could ever need. He'd used the faceless masses to hide before--something in Paris, maybe? Definitely a brisk fall evening in Moscow... He couldn't keep them straight, the cities, the rooftops, the guns, the handlers, the targets. They bled together like a watercolor painting someone had left out in the rain and then smudged in a half-assed effort to fix.

There’s a dark, smudgy painting in his mind now. Something about a man and a woman, cut brake lines on a rainy night, and him, standing in the middle of the road to make them swerve and flip. He barely felt the cold rain running down his face and dripping from his hair, because even as he radios in for extraction, as the phrase _target eliminated_ leaves his mouth, he can’t ignore the hot twinge in his chest and the brutal flash of recognition for the man now bleeding to death in the rain.

A man who reeked of cigarettes and who was wearing running shoes crowded in close to get a better look, and Bucky shuffled away, once again aware of the people around him.

There was an instinct he’d once had. They'd had to kill it to teach him to weave in and out of crowds, to use civilians as cover. Even now that urge was trying to claw its way back to the surface--Get away, get up high where you can see. You don't know who's in this crowd. You know you can't guarantee you’ll miss the civilians if you need to start shooting. That was an old voice, one that sounded less like Bucky and more like Sergeant Barnes.

*

They're in a village in Germany, just a tiny little stop on Steve's Great HYDRA Scavenger Hunt that had led them across war-torn Europe a handful of times. There are Nazi soldiers on one end of town, Allied on the other, and a handful of civilians too afraid to leave the crumbling homes in the middle. Steve says get eyes on the situation, so up Bucky goes. He climbs to the top of the teetering bell-tower of a half-destroyed church, prays he doesn't fall and die, and damn, that has to be some kind of symbolism.

He ignores the lurch in his stomach when he thinks he might fall and settles in, keeping his head low and eye to the scope of his rifle. There’s not much happening on the surface, but he sees movement in a building down the street--something he thinks might be an old schoolhouse. People flash by windows. They keep low and move too quickly for him to get a good look, but he catches a flash of swastika red and a dark glint of gunmetal, and that's good enough for him. After using hand signals to let Steve know what's going on--Stark is still tinkering with those damn radios he'd built them--he settles in to wait and watch.

At first it had made him nervous, watching Steve sprint and bash his way through HYDRA lines as he sat aloft and relatively safe. It went against nearly every gut feeling he had. He’s supposed to pull the big bullies away from Steve and kick them in the ass, not sit back and watch his friend take a hit. Things are different now. HYRDA and the Nazis might be bullies, but Steve is bigger than every one of them, and they haven’t invented a hit he can’t take. Besides, watching Steve's back is actually easier from up high.  
Steve and the rest of the Commandos approach the old school, moving quickly and quietly, keeping to cover, a seamless unit that never ceased to amaze. A flicker of movement in a window catches Bucky's eye. On the left side of the road, bunkered down in an abandoned house, a soldier raises a gun.

But he is in Bucky's crosshairs, and an instant later the report of his rifle shatters the wet, still hair and sends the Commandos scrambling back into cover. Breaking the silence is like breaking a dam, and bullets pour out into the street, peppering the walls of buildings, kicking up dust from the street, sliding off Steve's shield like so many drops of rain.  
It’s all thundering guns and the ricochet of Steve's shield as the soldiers in the houses decide to take a shot at Captain America. Steve is busy kicking a man in the chest and sending him flying, so Bucky takes out the soldier sneaking up behind him. He wings one about to throw a grenade behind the burnt-out truck Morita and Jones are using as cover. There is movement in one of the school windows as a soldier there opens fire. Bucky takes a shot and misses, puzzling briefly over what he'd thought had been a long blonde braid, but the gunman ducks back down beneath the windowsill and out of his sight.

This firefight is nothing compared to what they’ve seen before, so it’s only minutes before the Commandos and Steve make their way down the street and are ready to storm the school.

Bucky sees Steve motion to Dugan, sees the grenade in Dugan's hand, ready to be thrown through a broken window, sees a flash of movement in the school, and then a face--a boy, no older than ten, pale, with a gun in his hand, and all of the sudden the long blonde braid he’d seen makes sense. No radio, no way to get their attention, and only an instant before Dugan throws a grenade into what he thinks is a squad of Nazi soldiers leaves Bucky with exactly one option.

He shoots Steve.

Well, shoots _at_ him. The bullet pings off the shield, hitting the painted star dead center, and all the Commandos hit the dirt, thinking they’d missed an enemy or two. Steve, crouching behind his shield, finally looks up at him. Bucky waves his arms. _Hold fire_ , he signals, and Steve nods.

*****

The school had been filled with Hitler Youth and a few of their sisters, Bucky remembered, along with one Nazi asshole who’d put guns in their hands and told them to open fire. He remembered the way the man’s nose had broken beneath his fist once they’d cleared the school. He remembered how Steve hadn’t even scowled at him for doing it, just made a snarky comment. _Never thought I’d say thank you for shooting me._

He probably wouldn’t say thank you this time around.

 

**3\. He is an abomination.**

Azzano--there’s a whole wall dedicated to the insane rescue mission Steve pulled off, and why shouldn’t there be? Hundreds of soldiers, Captain America’s first blood, the good old-fashioned American obstinacy that led to Steve disobeying direct orders to save an entire division and one very dear friend.  The man with running shoes and no sense of personal space apparently found it fascinating. It was a great story.

It wasn’t a great memory, and, unlike the others, this wasn’t one he needed much help remembering.

There's cold and rain, a burning in his lungs, a dull, throbbing, crack where Lohmer had brought his knee up into his ribs. Then the isolation ward--needles and electricity--leather straps--burning shame as Zola reads a crumpled letter--wandering, groping hands--a shouted _no_ burned into his throat--and then Steve.

He shoved all that down deep because that's not the kind of memory he wants to get back. There was already enough of the bad in his head. He wanted to balance it out with something that didn't make him want to curl up out of fear and shame, and settled on what happened after the rescue on their trek back to base.  

*

They don't have any food. It turns out escaping prisoners are more interested in getting their hands on guns than cans of beans, but they manage to light a handful of fires and crowd around them. Steve is dogged by company. Everyone wants to know who he is and why he'd shown up so far behind enemy lines to save their lives. It's bizarre, seeing his friend so changed but still the same. His shoulders are broader and more muscular, but the way he squares them and stands up straight is exactly the same as it's always been. He might be several inches taller than Bucky now, but he can still see the way the corner of his mouth quirks up before he cracks a joke. He still has bronze brontosaurus balls, but now he has the power to back it up and doesn't need Bucky there any more to pull the bullies off him.

Steve's their savior, an honest-to-God hero. It's something Steve had wanted his whole life, even if he'd always been too stubborn to admit it. He deserves to revel in it. Bucky knows he'll only bring down the mood, so he leaves Steve to bask in the limelight and wanders off into the trees.

He likes the dark. He likes the way the fires dot the night like a swarm of flickering fireflies. There's the gentle rumble of soldier's voices and one or two bursts of laughter. It's almost peaceful, and it makes the tension in his chest rise and shriek, like a guitar wire that's been strung too tight and is threatening to break.

He refuses to think about the isolation ward and the letter and all the things that happened because of it, so he wonders about being dishonorably discharged instead. Would any of that be enough for them to boot him out? Can keep himself under control long enough to fool those who matter? He can't be sent home, not now that Steve is in Europe and hell bent on doing his part--

“Buck?" Steve's voice makes him jump and whirl around. A scientifically enhanced super soldier shouldn't be allowed to move so quietly. "Are you all right?”

“Yeah, of course,” Bucky says and immediately hates himself for the way his watery voice trembles and gives him away.

All he can see in the dark is Steve's outline, only a foot away, but he can still read the worried tilt of his head.  "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." This time his voice is stronger.

"Bull," Steve says. “Why are you crying?”

“Because…" Because I'm afraid you don't need me around anymore. Because you might not want me around if you knew. Because you're my best friend, and there are things I can never tell you.  "Because you’re still so ugly.”

Steve punches him playfully on the arm like he's done hundreds of times over the years. The familiarity of the action eases the tension in his chest, but damn, that’s the first time getting hit by Steve actually hurt.

 

**4\. He died.**

At least, everyone thought he had, and Bucky thought things would have been better that way.

 _The only Howling Commando to give his life,_ the exhibit said, and that was wrong in a different way. Every soldier had given at least part of his life--the nights spent sleeping on another country's ground, the pieces of their souls that were chipped away every time friend died or every time a bullet found its mark, the shadows that lingered for years after, even on sunny afternoons spent at home. All of those were pieces of their lives they'd given away.

Those killed in action had given the ultimate gift, of course, and Bucky still remembered when he was ready to give his.

*

 _Hot ice and wondrous strange snow_ \--he doesn't know where this bit of poetry came from, and he has no idea why it comes to him now. He only knows that it is fitting. The snow beneath him is so cold it burns. It's stained red from his fall, and he knows he'll die here. He's not dead yet, but everyone must think he is after a fall like that. No one will come looking for him. No one will even recover his body. It's not so bad, he thinks. The snow might be cold and soaked with his blood, but it's a soft pillow beneath his head, and the sounds of the river are soothing.

It's almost freeing.

It wasn't until later, after he'd woken up one arm short, strapped to a gurney and surrounded by Russians, that the same thoughts occurred to him again under a different light. Even if his body survived the fall, Bucky Barnes was dead. No one would come looking for him, and he wasn’t free at all.

 

**5\. He broke.**

He didn’t remember this, he simply knew it to be true. He stared at a picture of his face in his own little corner of the Smithsonian, celebrating a war hero tragically killed in action, and he wished once again that it were true. For the Bucky Barnes he remembers to become the Winter Soldier, he had to have been broken, irrevocably, radically, and completely. HYDRA had done the shattering, and then they’d been there to pick him up. They had glued the pieces back together like the shards of a mirror, and they had done it in such a way that his reflection was warped and twisted, missing certain pieces with extra, foreign pieces shoved in.

He clenches his metal hand into a fist and dimly registers the gears grinding against one another. Unbidden, he sees a guard he strangled to death with the his own jacket, a doctor whose head he bashed in after they’d given him his new arm, a trainer with a broken neck after he had a moment of defiance during advanced combat training.

There were probably more memories attached to that knowledge, but he didn’t go looking for them. HYDRA might have broken him and glued the pieces back together, but they cut themselves in the process. If he plunged his hands into that mess of sharp glass, the same would happen to him, and he had no desire to bleed today.

He turned abruptly and left the Smithsonian, acutely aware that the man in running shoes was following him.

 

**+1 Why, after everything, does Steve still think he deserves to be saved?**

He'd walked into the Smithsonian with a blank slate and a gaping, dark abyss where his mind should be. All the museum had done was give him a flashlight, and all he'd been able to see with it were leviathan slithering through the dark, all slimy skin and crooked teeth and too many eyes.

It was a mistake to come here.

And not only because he'd remembered far too few warm afternoons and far too many horrors. The cigarette man, the one in shoes that would help him run but wouldn't help him kick in someone's ribs, was following him. Steve and his friend’s had cut off HYDRA’s head, but he knew how the saying went. HYDRA was everywhere. He knew that just as surely as he knew they would try to take him back if they could. They would put him back in the chair, and everything--even the monsters--would sink back into the dark.

His stalker kept his distance, trying to stop Bucky from noticing him. Bucky turned down a darkening street and had plenty of time to duck into a doorway before the man turned the corner and realized he'd lost sight of his target. He pulled something from his jacket pocket. It was too small to be a gun but glinted silver in the dying sunlight, and hurried down the street, right past Bucky.

His arm whipped out in an instant, a streak of metal lightning, and before the man had time to react or Bucky even had time to realize he’d moved, he had the man pinned to the side of the building by his throat, his feet more than a foot off the ground. The man lashed out with the syringe. The needle tore through the fabric of his jacket but only caught on his metal arm and broke. After that, the man's struggles became increasingly ineffective. He swung his arms clumsily and flailed his legs as panic, brought on by the inability to breathe, set in. There was a calm, blank space in Bucky's mind--the blank slate the Smithsonian had been unable to fill--that made him content to watch this man choke to death, and one of the leviathan growled in his ear to just squeeze a little harder... snap his neck...

He is Bucky Barnes, he remembered. His best friend is Steve Rogers, and he only kills people who deserve to be killed. Does this man deserve it? He didn't know, but he knew he had no right to pass judgement. It seemed hypocritical. If he wanted to be judge, jury, and executioner, his first and only victim should be himself. So why had Stave tried to save him, even as his face had broken beneath the Soldier’s arm? Why had he even bothered?

Bucky forced his metal hand to let go and the man sagged to the ground, wheezing and gasping. Bucky didn't spare him a glance. He simply turned to leave, ready to drown himself in self-hate, the Potomac, or both, when a second needle tore through his jeans.

He stumbled and fell, his right leg going numb almost instantly. As the man coughed and scrambled to his feet, the numbness spread with alarming speed. By the time it reached his head, spinning his world on a dozen different axes, a black van had screeched to a halt in front of him.

He couldn’t fight as two more men stepped out, couldn’t move as their hands gripped his arms and hauled him up. By the time he was in the van, the blackness at the edge of his vision had completely overtaken him, and he found it to be horrifyingly familiar.

He hoped Steve had someone to tell him not to look for him.

He hoped Steve would realize he didn’t deserve to be saved.

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, sorry for any mistakes I missed in proof-reading (I'm horrible at spotting my own!). This is the last time I ever try to experiment with verb tenses...
> 
> BTW, I have abandoned this now so... sorry if anyone was expecting the next installment? 
> 
> I would love to hear what you think! Thanks for reading.


End file.
